What would you think if I told you everyone grows forever? This was investigated after graves were opened and hair and nails were found that had appeared to grow while in the casket. One thing many people did not cosider was the possibility that the corpse's head and hands could have shrunk due to dehydration, resulting in the skin to shrink back on the corpse which allows more hair and nails to appear on the outside of the body. The general population was easily persuaded in 1959, when Vincent Price's character's nails and hair continued to grow after he died in The Tingler. Tough the thoughts of dehydration have spread around to many scientists and doctors, who continue to believe it is possible for hair and nails can continue to grow after death.
Among these scientists and doctors are George M. Gould and Walter L Pyle who believe the growth of hair and fingernails can occur even after a person dies! They exclaim there have been records of changed hair color, the length of hair, and the length of the finger nails of the corpse. Gould and Pyle write about a corpse “whose hair protruded at the points where the joints of the coffin had given away. The fair of the head measured 18 inches, that of the beard eight inches” (Postmortem Anomalies). On the other hand, some scientists and doctors, like Alan Gunn, do not believe it is possible for hair and nails to grow after one is dead. Gunn claims, “When someone’s heart stops pumping blood around their body, the tissues and cells are deprived of oxygen and rapidly begin to die,” which would not allow hair and nails to continue to grow (Essential Forensic Biology).
Though many people have believed hair and nails could grow on a corpse, it is not true. Dehydration shrinks the body, not the nails or hair, so it appears as if the hair and nails grow after the person is dead. In Alan Gunn’s book “Essential Forensic Biology”, Gunn explains how the “shrinkage of the skin can make it seem as though [hair and nails grow]” (Essential Forensic Biology). Though some of the population continues to believe nails and hair can grow on a corpse, it is impossible. Though it is portrayed that it could happen, due to the dehydrated body of the corpse.
